Spellbroken
by WhymsicalBell
Summary: Ever since Merope drugged Tom Riddle Sr with the love potion the last few months flew by in a blissful state of intoxication. However, when one day she decides she's had enough and leaves his pitcher clear of the potion...Tom's eyes fluttered open, surprise and agony mixed on his features. The spell had broken...enchantment gone...it was just fate and them. Tom/Merope Romance. AU.
1. The State of Things

Spellbroken

Chapter 1 - The State of Things

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The last few months had passed fairly blissfully to Merope's memory. Of course, her previous life hadn't exactly been in the best conditions either, so supposedly anything else would be blissful in comparison. But she thought the recent line of events to be extra blissful, in all that occured.

The past was littered with bad memories. Well. To be honest Merope's memories of her homelife and childhood weren't always so bad. There had been considerably more wealth when she was born, not a lot, but her father did save up a little for the newborn baby, so she remembered being fairly well fed and looked after when she was born. It was only temper tantrums, anger management issues, and the like which spoke out, along with alcohol the general living state that made her life hell. The later eras of her life at home was characterised by frequent beatings, periods of near starvation, of struggling to make ends meet. Her brother wasn't always nasty to her, but cajoled by her father and her being the youngest, he eventually shifted to a constant state of near teasing and abuse. It was nasty at times, but she supposed somewhere deep down, there was a good heart. Somewhere.

She had been to muggle school for a little while. Before she got pulled out. Knew a little of sums and letters but not much, and her father and brother had attempted to teach her magic for a little bit, before their tempers got the better of them, and the lessons turned into screaming matches.

Still, her life wasn't as miserable as one might have made it out to be, and it was only the latent eras of it that was filled with the abuse and misery anyone who saw them would have witnessed. Indeed, the last couple of years seemed littered with bad memories and running away, hiding, struggling to make ends meet, survival, things had gotten worse with both her father and her brother's temper, and it seemed like there was no escape. No way to leave.

Tom Riddle had been in a way, a path to escapadom. A path to freedom. A path to solitude. He seemed like a way out, and she clung onto him like a daydream. He was handsome yes, and he certainly had a fine display of manners when he chose to, but a little part of her also clung so ardently to him because it was just a way out of their home.

She remembered watching him ride by, sometimes with some village girl that she was destined to never be, and thinking he looked so romantic, and if only he could look at her like that, and oh how it would be a way out.

It had been a whirlwind when after one particularly bad fight, she brewed the love potion. It hadn't exactly been done out of jealousy or evil intentions by any rate, she just wanted out and just wanted to talk to him but didn't have the courage to say a word to him, and somewhere in the back of her mind, was the faint voice from her childhood teachings that a love potion made someone like you, like the way a child thinks medicine makes everything better. It had been so simplistic.

She brewed it. Given the immense amount of time neither of the two members of her family dedicated to her, and the fact that they lived in a little visited area by muggles which had quite a fair few plants of magical properties, the brewing of the potion went along at a much faster pace than she had ever anticipated. Getting a part of him wasn't particularly difficult. He had this habit of dusting bits of hair and trivial things from his riding cape when he drove by, often stopping near the house, as if glad it wasn't near anywhere 'proper' so that he wasn't spotted grooming himself, before riding away with a self satisfied smirk. It wasn't hard to pick up the embers of hair that fluttered in the wind, before dropping them in the potion.

It all went swimmingly. After the first sip, he easily fell in love with her, and after a brief conversation they decided to leave her house, run away from home. They didn't have anywhere to go, though he had some wealth with him, he was disconnected from the greater clutches of the Riddle house on the economy, and they had no where to spend it, not wanting to risk being recognised. Instead they went around the countryside on the horse that he came with, and stayed at odd little places here and there. They had only recently found a lodging in this abandoned property near the countryside, where Merope had found that from the there or four blissful months they spent together, under the brought reality by the spell of the love potion, she had fallen pregnant.

She hadn't exactly meant to get pregnant per say. He was attractive yes, and even though it had been so long in her life since she last felt what she would say was anything remotely close to affection or love for her, and the idea of having a little kid all to herself was so overwhelming, she did want to be a mother, someday, in the horizon, perhaps. But not now, she was much too young for it.

But she was scared and still riding on the exhileration of getting away with the love potion, he was more welcoming and receptive of her advances than she ever expected, and one thing lead to another, and suddenly she found herself missing a period. She remembered vaguely, before her mother died, that sometimes girls missed periods due to stress or whatever, but she had also inadvertly been responsible for the family's housework and housekeeping since her mother's death, so she had a better grasp on survival and maintaining health than either of her two remaining family members could have guessed, so she wasn't exactly on the brink of ill health at the time she ran away with Tom.

She had been in quite okay health, considerably better since she ran away with him, and her monthlys had been regular for quite some time. She was certain, that she was expecting, and even more so, she just 'felt' it the moment more than a few days had passed, it had been a shock to her as well. A wake-up call almost. As if this was more than just a childish tirade of running away in the woods to live amongst a fairy godmother and small (friendly) woodland creatures or something.

She'd never explicitedly wanted to run away to have a child with him specifically (just to be with him), but the romantic idea of running away in the woods and starting a family and living happily ever after did, come to mind when she drugged him and the first day they escaped, but it had never been one of her main plans, and now that she was met with the reality of it all, it all suddenly seemed bigger and more intense than she could handle, and a huge wake-up call. It also felt wrong to keep feeding him the potion.

A million questions came to mind now, that she stood, three or four months deep in the mess of running away. Those three or four months had been blissful, beyond blissful, like a dream within a dream, the best block of her life she had experienced on this terrible and bitter world of the earth she supposed. But vaguely, somewhere in the back of her mind, came the idea that this was to come to an end, it wasn't right, something had to change, it couldn't go on forever. She would eventually stop giving him the love potion either out of guilt or fear, or something would happen so that she wasn't able to keep brewing it.

It took her several more months before she finally had the courage to. But, one day, she just decided to stop. Maybe it was this idea that she was pregnant, unexpected as it was, that he would not leave her. Maybe she hoped he had truly fallen in love with her too during their time together. Maybe. Maybe. She didn't know. Life had turned a hard road and become difficult and she didn't know what to do. A million hopes and dreams were hanging on by a thread.

When one day, she decided to stop the love potion and lift the enchantment away. That morning, Tom drank from his pitcher the usual glass of orange juice or whatever liquid she managed to sneak the potion in, but it was devoid of the shimmery sweet liquid, and as he stood up afterwards to go and touch up on his hair, eyes perhaps already glimmering with a little more recognition as the diminishing dose from yesterday ebbed away some more, she smiled uncertainly at him, before going to their room which she commonly frequented. By herself some time alone before he would come to find her, after having come to their senses afterward.

She stared at her palms, and then at the small bulge underneath her dress, than at the wrinkled and mysterious lines of her palms all over again. Wondering what she had done, and what was to become of things now.

And that was the day that the spell became broken. Spellbroken, enchantment finished, lifted out of a fantasy and into the real world...

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Author's Note: Hey so...I've always felt a bit sorry for Merope, and quite like the dark side a lot in fandoms (lol, yay for Draco, Lucius, Snape and Tom Riddle Jr *hearts*) so I decided to write a fanfiction where things do go well. Because I always thought Tom Riddle Sr made a rather rushed decision to run away in the books, and had he stayed for a bit longer and actually talked to her or found out what happened, things might have been different. But oh well. Btw, this is a fluffy/romance sort of thing, so don't expect a lot of plot with the 'Dark Lord' (which doesn't even happen in this story) or like, _that_ type of story. Okay thanks, peace out and please review! xd


	2. The Awakening

Spellbroken

Chapter 2 - The Awakening

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Tom Riddle Senior had been quite obviously drugged by the love potion for quite some time. If you counted from the day he took the first sip, not to before they ran away, the total maybe spanned close to half a year or something under the enchantment.

A love potion had a peculiar effect on it's members having taken it for quite some time, and just because he was a muggle, did not mean he was any less receptive to the pecularities of said potion.

The past six or so months had flown by an intoxicated, fast-paced sense of doom that no one, unless they took a love potion, could have hoped to understand what it was like.

Sipping a love potion was different from falling in love by many, many, different ways, but the one most common wasn't that you ever 'fell' in love, or there was a conscious decision you liked someone, or a 'conscious' shift that your objective on a certain individual had changed.

No. Whereas if one fell in love naturally, there would be a point where someone consciously shifted from 'friend' to 'lover', 'acquantaince' to 'fiancee', but under the guise of the love potion, it had felt like tumbling headlong down the rabbit hole and suddenly, without reason or cause, Merope was /everything/ and /everything/ for existence, and his entire existence and fabrication of the universe hung about her, and he was to do anything and everything for her.

Under the guise of the love potion, and the affected mentality, everything had felt so right and dear, but now, as he was coming out of it...

People still kept their memories from Amortentia. It was a love potion, not a memory modifying potion afterall. People still kept their memories, their 'urges' to love the brewer, though it may have been alien to them, people still kept everything, and it was only their sense of disconnect when struggling to come to terms with it later that meant formed the real cracks on it.

Tom had vaguely remembered the last 6 months as an insanely blissful and sickly sweet time of blissfulness and sweetness. Everything had seemed to fly by so quickly and the sky seemed half red in the altered vision of everything, time slipped by without so much as a backwards gaze at him, like a river sweeping him in it's path, and now all of a sudden, it was ending. This blissful piece of artificial heaven and trip down the rabbit hole was ending, the little slice of enchanted reality was ending, ending, the spell was broken, and suddenly,

his eyes fluttered open from when he blinked, he was seated at their bed in the room, arm curled around Merope from where he was sure he had came into the room and pulled her into some blissful nestle or something beforehand, and now, he opened his eyes to the sight of a brown-haired, stringy looking girl with deep brown and slightly violet eyes and a shy smile staring back.

All happy feelings and feelings of familiarity instantly flew away. This wasn't the girl he was in love with that he'd spent half a year with trapidising around the countryside. This wasn't someone he regularly spoke to or talked to for half a year or more.

It was a stranger. A new person, a witch, somebody who quite obviously drugged him and put him in a drug induced euphoria, and now he was met with the reality of everything.

Merope stared at him. She wasn't the best at reading people, not having had much practice at home for her brother and father expressed about three emotions at most - boredom, mirth and anger. Though you could say boredom was an absence of mirth. But even now, she was completely unsure of his thoughts.

She was certain she saw the spell 'break' behind his eyes, as he stared at her. Deep brown eyes expressing true cognition for perhaps the first time she saw him, and something shimmered beneath his gaze.

She wasn't sure what she did next. Perhaps it was because she expected him to say something, perhaps it was because she expected him to point out the next step in their plan, perhaps it was because she expected him to have some reaction that she could react to, but she opened her mouth to say something, anything.

Then, his eyes fell on the small bulge underneath her dress, and he shifted back a little. Perhaps scared, perhaps - Merope didn't know. All she knew was that she screamed, then he screamed, then they screamed something intelligible at each other, then he reached out to her and she got up and bolted out of the room.

Tom stared at the door where she had just left.

When he awoke, he wasn't sure what to do. The fragments of the past were spinning together all so quickly afterwards, his mind struggling to put together the events of the past that he previously hadn't been able to consider whilst under the love potion's influence.

He had been drugged. He was sure of it. He didn't know what, or by what means, but this girl, this girl who he vaguely remembered to be one of the poor Gaunt people, in the little twisted area by the hump at the edge of the village, had drugged him or something. She must've liked him or something, it was the only reason he could come up with.

Though now that he was out of the Amortentia, the memories of them together faded and blurred a little. He couldn't remember feeling real or true love from her.

They were together. He vaguely remembered having sex together. He thought with a groan. Then, he had the memory of her telling him she was expecting. Amortentia was a love potion, not a memory potion. He remembered being superifically happy. Well of course he was, amortentia tended to work that way. Whatever made her happy made him happy, in this instance, since she had a surface level of happiness about the pregnancy at that time, he was happy about it was well. They had lived out some more months together in this world of the shack.

And then...

the dream ended. He woke up. The realities kept running back. How long had he been gone? Would he be missed at home? Had they started a search party? Had they declared him dead? What would happen to his engagement with Cecilia? What would his mother think? What would his father think? Would his mother have cut him from the family lineage? How did the neighbouring villages think? And her? What about her? She had a family, he was sure of it. Ill-mannered and queer people as they were, he had seem them enough to know they existed. What had happened with them?

And the child...

Now that reality had caught up to him. He hoped that part was false. But then he saw the small baby bump beneath her dress and felt shock and horror. He had moved back in agony of realisations. There was many things to consider, but one thing that was for sure, was that whatever had happened, he wasn't sure altogether had bad intentions.

There were many questions. On his side as well as hers. But one thing he was able to piece out - was that whatever it was, whatever she was planning, she had probably wanted to make him fall in love with her or something. Whatever it was, it wasn't necessarily evil. Ill-thought out and chaotic, but not necessarily bad.

It was a difficult situation to be in, and a lesser man may have given it up, gotten up and ran away frmo the difficult situation without even looking back, without even trying to think it all through and figure out what happened, and maybe he did in another life, another bad decision he would have made in another life, but yet, this time, he decided to stay on a little longer. Real true curiosity tinged at his mind. He also wanted to know how she, a mere straggler at the edge of the road, managed to get him, to ... fall in love with her, even if momentarily.

He reached out to grab her. She screamed in terror some more. He didn't remember, perhaps he screamed something at her to get her to shut up and listen to him. But then she turned and with one last fleeing look of true horror on her face, had left the room and slammed the door shut between them.

He watched her go, in this queer house, in this strange place. This strange person he had barely even knew. Watched this other sentient being that shared the place with him leave, and then stared at the surroundings even more. It was a difficult situation, but he'd found himself in worse, and he wasn't going to give up. With a shaky breath and a thousand questions in his head, he got up and tried to find her.


	3. Dream Ended

Spellbroken

Chapter 3 - Dream ended

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It had been dark and gloomy when Merope bounded down the steps. She was terrified and just wanted to get away and wasn't looking where she was going and tripped, falling down the stairs and then face-first on the floor. All she remembered was a world of pain before she blacked out.

Perhaps this is death. She thought. Perhaps this is the end to my life in the world.

Blue skies...perhaps seeing her mother again, the sweet lull of heaven against the dull blackness - if she could even afford to go to heaven now. Maybe she would wake up in hell. Hell. More pain hit her, from whatever limbo or translucent coma she was in.

The world seemed to throb with darkness and pain, and everything seemed to tinge with hurt.

Before she came to her senses, as if awakening from a dream a second time, the first being the day she decided to stop feeding Tom the love potion, and awoke.

She was in a dark room. It must've been night or something. A single candle with orange flames flickered at the edge of her vision. Fireflies fluttered on the window outside. An owl cooned and through the evening dusk, she could make out the faint shadows of trees and boats.

A man sat at the edge of the room. Tall, dark brown hair, brown eyes, pale features and an aristocratic smirk somewhere but it wasn't to be found. He sat on a low chair, travelling clothes on, a penknife in his hand, the remains of an apple on an even lower stool in front of him, the peel trailing of the side.

He was so familiar and yet not so. Outside the wind blew, a breeze picked up, and he stood still, just staring at her.

The second thing Merope experienced was an even greater pain. Dull pain this time, but seeping into what felt like almost every crack or crevice of her body. Her arms, legs, all limbs had been affected really...torso, even a patch on her head throbbed with something that felt more serious than a mild headache.

She stared at the familiar yet so unfamiliar man beside her. Many emotions flooded through her, almost like she was a sift and trying to figure out which one to keep and pay attention to first, shock was a close second one.

"You stayed..." she said. Her voice was cracked. It perhaps may have been one day, or one day and a night, since she last remembered things. She wasn't certain of it or anything else. Or why the man with the future ahead of him and the world on his shoulders decided to stay since the effects of the love potion wore out. It felt like a dream as she stared at him. This figure in the darkened room who truly, held his fist wrapped around her heart at this moment, she supposed he could shatter it for real or...she didn't know. It felt like some twisted reality where there wasn't the buffer of the love potion to determine anything, it was just them now. And the shades of reality that spanned out their life.

"I usually stay enough in difficult situations to figure out the best course of action, then proceed to it," he said, a little more formally than she was used to hearing from him, though not unkindly, "Afterall. How was my lineage able to win the land of Little Hanley from the feugal wars of the past if we didn't plan?" He said. She wasn't sure if he was joking or not.

"Why did you stay? There's somewhere better to go," she tried to sit up, and winced in pain as she did so. She then noticed she was tucked in a way that was all too carefully to have been accidental had she been simply tucked into the bed, and her shoes hung a little way of, and there were extra blankets and a water and a towel, and some bottle of liquid not too far of. She glanced at her stomach to confirm what she already knew, she had lost the baby.

"It must have been scary to wake up and..."

"I did wake up and think I was in a precarious situation," he said, staring at the walls, Merope now recognised they were in the downstairs laundry area, close to the place where she supposed she had fell, staring at the place beyond the window, staring at her. The two traded tense but fully alert glances for perhaps the first time in their relationship. "It's strange you know. Going for a ride by yourself one day, accepting a drink from a girl, what was it, lemonade or orange juice-"

"Lemonade," she confirmed.

"Agreeing to run away with someone I never even knew, though now...perhaps I see there is something more beneath the surface. And finding the next six or so months of my life to be the most happiest I ever felt, before awakening to find myself devoid of all emotions I felt during it and just..."

He stopped. Outside the wind in the branches stopped as well, as if looking at them. Willows, they were in an area with willows. Her first wand was a willow wand. She vaguely wondered what wand he would have if he were a wizard, how he would react if she told him...

"Curious. It's a curious situation to be in." He drew short, staring at her with a pointed but curt glance. She wasn't sure what she was supposed to feel. Guilt maybe, but she had already been feeling it for quite some time before she stopped the potion.

"I thought it was unwise to back out without further consideration. A situation is not without a close looking at and proper solution," he continued staring at her. Not unfriendly, but not friendly either, curt, his eyes drew blanks to his soul. "There is a local church that's generous with charity..."

She fell silent, not sure what to say. Didn't know what to say. A million things were spinning through her mind. She hadn't stopped to consider what would happen to her parents and brother now that she was gone. What would happen to Marvolo? To Morfin? To her memory he had been recently arrested and put in Azkabam for having finally been caught terrorising muggles shortly before she left. In fact, she planned it with Tom (oh how childish it seemed, cajoling him into some plan he didn't even believe in, back then) so that the date of their leaving coincided shortly just a few days after he'd been officially taken to prison. Her brother had been distraut for the first time in years, and she'd banked on that distrautness to make her final escape but...

"Until then, I think the best thing is to try and get in contact with civilisation again, and journey back to the village," he said, looking at her out of the corner of his eye but yet not considering her opinions on the matter, he paced to a window and stared out, greviences deep on his forehead, a glowering serious aristocratic expression.

A frog gave a friendly croak and an owl fluffed up it's feathers as it gave a friendly hoot. He sighed and gave up and turned back to the embers of the room, the candle which was nearly going out, the long shadows it drew onto the ransackedness of everything else within. He busied himself with finding and setting up a new candle as the evening grew darker. "I think we mostly travelled west since the run-away day. We could be anything from ten to a hundred miles outside of what is Little Hangley. I'll try write to the local villagers, or something, as we near. You should to. We'll find out more about where things lie as we get closer, but or now, I think we should make our way back and then figure out what to do. I may never see you again after this, but there's ample time to talk along the way. You should eat something," he said, nodding to a small stool Merope hadn't even noticed. On it was a few manageable pieces of stale bread, a thin sort of broth and on a spoon next to it, a generous serving of whatever liquid was in the bottle. Some muggle medicine or something.

She was ravenous after being out for several days, and managed it without must haste. Though afterwards she felt like she ate so much her stomach could burst. Not eating for a long time tended to do that to you.

"How long have I been out?" she asked, sitting straighter some more, she winced, "It sounds like a good idea..I don't have a better one," she admitted among flutters of sadness.

"Why am I hurt in so many places?"

"Three days," he responded, "I'm not sure, but I think you fell down a flight of stairs-"

"I did," she confirmed.

"I've never seen someone get that many injuries from falling down a flight of stairs before..." he replied back, going to the apple once again, and eating at it. "They're growing wild near here," he said, "We're very far from civilisation. We should be leaving the next morning to find our way back."

Merope nodded glumly, she had nothing more to say.

"You have a lot of explaining to do," he said sharply, looking at her. "A lot. I expect to hear a full recount of this...peculiarity when you're up to it. I presume your intention was to somehow make me fall in love with you, and then...I lost the plot with what the next part of your plan was. You'd have to inform me once you're up to it."

She nodded, "I was scared...among other things. Anyway, I ran down the steps and tripped because I was scared. I've also lost the baby...," she replied.

"That's not a problem for us out here. Women lose babies all the time. Their health generally rights things around afterwards. How are you faring mentally?"

He looked at her. She sighed and stared up at the ceiling. A fungi spore was growing in a delightful pattern about the battered and winded rafters.

"I wasn't ready for it anyways," she said. "It's probably for the better."

"I'd say so," he agreed. He didn't know quite what came over him, and it wasn't like the love potion either, but out here, in this weird situation with someone he barely even knew, agreeing on something that seemed so important and significant, even if they barely knew each other, he flashed her a smile within these fleeting moments. She met him with a raw bittersweet one back.

They spoke little more words, just continually eating some more, Merope took the dosage of muggle medicine he'd measured out for her, he went to check up on some of the traps he set. She sighed and stared at the ceiling, this little derelict place which was so similar to home, but yet so different, now with her father gone and her brother not knowing where she was and therefore no obligation to return home...the future seemed impossibly sparse and was spinning with something so...

She had no structure to her life. Never did. Never had.

Little idea of what was going to happen next, living life by the day ever since her mother died really, and a bit before that too. Her mother wasn't as crazy as the rest of the family, but not by much. It seemed that life for her was a cacophony of noise and fleeting moments, clinging onto the good when they lasted and staring at surprise at the events life laid out for her.

She switched her glance from the ceiling to the soft candlelight falling by the wayside, the warm tones flooding through the window as she stared out at this patch of obscure English countryside they now resided in, the owls in the distance, the willows swinging and trailing on some ill-frequently visited lake, the fireflies humming about like bright spools of light upon the waves.

It was a fleeting moment of simplicity that almost seemed to good to be true, once again, but she knew it was different. She knew the morning brought new challenges and that underneath the polite and gentle exchanges that had gone on between them, something had shifted and there were real priorities and things to uncover later.

She closed her eyes and drifted of to sleep, a reprieve to hide away from the reality she had woken up into.

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Author's Note: Sorry about the miscarriage for all readers that wanted to see that arc of the story happen :/ But I just wanted to focus on their romance without the baby storyline, anyways, hope y'all have a good day and please review!


	4. Much Needed Conversation

Spellbroken

Chapter 4 - Much Needed Conversation

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**Author's Note: Hello! Thanks for still reading and keeping up with this story, even though it's been almost forever. I'm sorry for putting an author's note at the start, I hate it when authors do that too, but there were some important things I felt needed to be said. Firstly, I'm sorry for the no updates in forever. At the time I started this story I thought I would have regular updating schedule and planned to write and update regularly, but then some unexpected things happened in my life and I was suddenly short on time (but in a good way ^^). Even now my schedule has changed so I'm still unable to have a regular updating schedule and chapters would unfortunately be irregular for the foreseeable future. Originally I was going for a sort of light, poetic, soft, feel with this story, almost like a fairytale, and there was going to be some subtlies built up in the chapters to fully explore the soft but subtle mood. And although some authors might be able to still achieve that with irregular updating schedules, I'm the type of person that finds it really hard to keep the continuity, especially the mood (and because this story was originally planned to be a subtle one) over irregular periods of time. So I decided to change it, and instead of being poetic or subtle, it's now just a story. Slightly more realistic, probably more things happening sooner, but still a story of what happened between Tom and Merope after the spell ended should he choose to stay. I understand if it's disappointing, or anger-inducing for some readers, and I'm sorry the time never worked out to write this story a particular way, but please respect that I thought this was the best way going forward, and just enjoy the story that is actually here and just is. Thanks for reading this and honestly, if you're still here and still reading and reviewing and keen to find out what happens next, thanks so much all of you, I can't thank you enough for your patience, I felt really guilty about it :(( **

* * *

They had woken up with the birds calling and the sun shining, and it probably been a little too late past sunrise, when Tom gently prodded her from her sleep, provisions and travelling items all laid out, and they were to begin the long journey home. All around them was wilderness and countryside Merope didn't remember, it was fascinating how much you missed whilst travelling on a whim running away from home, and constantly worrying about drugging up an innocent person.

She was surprised to see that he had been brushing the horse, and feeding it a generous amount of the wild apples and radishes that must've been lying around the countryside. Having never seen a horse or lived in a residence that could handle the upkeep of any, Merope hadn't much to do with this animal, but even then, she could see it was harder to keep and maintain than first thought, and he was feeding it and brushing the main with tender care, tutting a little as he worked. Suddenly she felt very out of her depth, and like she had uprooted a man and his horse devastatingly, from a life she never knew and understood.

"I'm sorry about your horse," she blurted out before she could stop herself.

The horse, a white stallion with gray tail, mane, and flecks upon his face, glanced up as if sensing being talked about, and neighed in response. But it was a haunghty neigh, and afterward it glanced away, barely looking at her, flicking it's tail in annoyance as Tom continued brushing it. Merope hadn't particularly noticed it before, but it's fur had gotten all knotted and matted, and the tangible difference was right there.

"Alabaster doesn't like you," Tom pointed out simply at that neigh.

Merope glanced down at her hands. There was some bread, apple and berries left out for her on a log nearby. Tom wasn't eating or had wanted food in the few moments she'd been up, so she assumed he had already eaten. It was lucky she chose summer to leave for there was still food around. She worked out it had to be for her, and there was nothing better to do than eat it, so she busied herself with that. Suddenly feeling very childish and foolish in a way. In fact, to say so would be an understatement. Ever since she had woken up, the entire childishness of the situation beamed through, and all the hidden shame erupted forth. It had been one of the most embarrassing ideas she had, which wasn't saying much for her home was rife with embarrassing situations, and even for someone like her, the shame felt never-ending.

"I don't like him," she said, maybe it was the fact that there was a lucid, non-drugged up person in her company for the first time in forever, or the fact that she had never really known the right thing to say to smooth things out, that these situations were bringing out honest answers in her - for the time being. She was still uncertain if she wanted to tell a complete stranger about the magic and wizarding world and everything, and as time went on, deciding more and more against it, "seems more trouble than it's worth."

"I've never liked horses much either," said Tom, "we only kept them around because it was how respectable people got around in the olden times, and my father has too much fondness for them. It was mostly the stablehands that looked after them. I had some practice of course," he said, finishing up the coat. Alabaster flicked his tail and the pull of his head against the muzzle suggested to Merope, that he didn't particularly like Tom either.

"My father is a stickler for old things too. But it's not with horses," she said, and found herself cackling up all of a sudden. She thought maybe she glimpsed a smile on Tom's face too. Who would've thought she had something in common with the strange man who rode by once in a while?

"I daresay it's not with snakes either," said Tom, "When I saw your family, I thought, the dead snakes nailed to the door can't possibly be the end of this freakshow."

"It's not," said Merope before she could even help herself, thinking of the blood politics, Salazar Slytherin and the internal arguments that had gone on in her house.

"Is it hard to talk about?" He had finished up and the next moment they were on the horse and comfortably riding of towards home, or rather, uncomfortably. It seemed Alabaster was purposefully trying to make the ride as uncomfortable as possible, cantering up and down here and there, and making it as bumpy as he could.

"How do you know?" asked Merope, thinking that 'crazy family' were all the words somebody else would have used to describe the family.

"My family has their feuds too. We didn't obtain Little Hangleton in the olden days by inviting people to tea parties and asking them to hand their land over. Several years of that has had some ties between some families fraught with tension and," he chuckled, "a manner of interesting affairs enough to write a satire. I know my way around internal family politics more than you might think."

"Oh, good. Be prepared to hear the craziest you've ever heard. I don't even have much contact with anyone outside my family and even I know they're nuts," said Merope, everything rising to the surface all of a sudden.

'Try me."

"Well, what would you say if I told you we were witches and wizards?" she asked.

"Like the ones in fairytales?"

"What's a fairytale?"

"How about I do the asking," Tom switched tactics, trying to pierce together the pieces of information in this latest claim, "You live near the edge of the woods?"

"We live where we can afford. For some wizarding families it's a house with their own gardens and holiday house. Some a well-do cottage with a waterfront view. The ones you find living in a shack at the edge of the wood are broke," she said. Even though Merope had mostly stayed in her home, she had gone to other wizarding homes, usually distant relatives who claimed not to be related, a couple of times in her life. Enough that she did know how to explain things a little.

"So you're a broke. Witches or wizards usually aren't. But you happen to be both a witch from a wizarding family and in a worrying financial state," he said.

"We had money once. A small fortune if you would believe it, but it was all gone by the time I was born-"

"This is all too familiar," said Tom.

"It's happened to you?"

"It's happened to families like myself. You know, half the reason why the Riddles are the wealthy leaders of the village has less to do with bloody exploits, and more to do with the fact that we resisted whatever crazy the other families had in order to squander all their wealth...I'm no stranger to it, really..."

"Well, the crazy gene hit up all generations of my family in all the near pasts," said Merope, finally able to admit these about her past, "My father suspects we're inbred. But he can't really remember all lines of the family tree. We tried to maintain a name and lineage apparently, it was notable once."

Tom whistled, "Prominence and wealth. No wonder your family fell to pieces, they are notoriously hard to keep. What's the reason for the prominence, if you don't mind me asking?" he said, turning the horse a little. They had already travelled quite a way along these plains.

"School. An ancestor founded a school along with one other wizard and two witches."

"Must have been a very good school for the founders to have prominence. Was it for witches and wizards?"

"Yes, it was the only one in Britain at the time."

"How did you manage an education before it came about?"

"Taught magic at home mostly. Passed down in families. It was uneven, as you could imagine," said Merope, remembering her father's rants about disgraceful teachings. Except it was a particular type of family he had said taught magic poorly, three guesses which.

"The same inequalities are found in the non witch or wizarding world. Do the witches and wizards in your society pay you visits and keep acknowledgement of your ancestry's foundership?" asked Tom, thinking that it was probably helpful to get as much information out of this crazy situation as possible. Fifty percent chance she was just a gypsy of some sort tricking him, but there was a note of desperation and despair in her eyes he didn't think matched any trickster he'd seen, and it was one hell of a crazy story, even to his ears.

"The last time anyone from that world visited us it was to tell my father of for improper use of magic, and come to think of it, all the previous times before that for the same reason too. If they did want something from us, I haven't heard of it. But then again, I'm not very high up in my family and don't hear the most. My father reckons they forgot about us though, and only our immediate family tree, that's him, my brother and I, know the glory of our ancestry."

"Women are rarely appreciated for their proper role in the family," said Tom, thinking that if what Merope said wasn't a complete joke, there was actually strong parallels between the stiff, proper systems of what seemed to be some form of hierarchy and tensions there as in the non witch or wizarding world, and the same roles of women and men in families too, that he vaguely remembered from what he had thought to be some of his more boring lessons about the world at the time. Really, they had more in common than they thought, and Merope was the ancestor of someone renowned in their world. She was just one (or two) generations of inbred away from that. Like a princess fallen from her castle and rightful joist of the crown. Really, they were almost the same person, and there was haunting similarities between her family and him, now that he thought of it. And perhaps she understood some of the same tensions about keeping appearances or preserving the family that he did, more than she knew she understood, and it was certainly different to Ceceila. Who was mostly a girl from an well-do family that never had to worry about a noble name or lineage to hold onto, and had simply been hoping to marry into a rich family. His head swarm a little. Oh Ceceila, they were three months from getting engaged when he was kidnapped by Merope, though now that kidnapping seemed more meaningful than just a runaway with a random tramp, knowing some of the histories or at least, what the kidnapper must've thought when she had...enslaved him with some sort of magical love potion he supposed, it seemed to be quite peculiar. He had a sense that if what she was saying was correct, then he probably played a bigger role and significance in her fantasy than some random opportunistic tramp.

"I don't suppose it was easy to establish the proper order and rightful way you should be treated given the situation your family found themselves in. Do you trust your father when he says absolutely no one knows about your ancestry except for himself?" Tom said, what was actually going through his mind at the moment was that if the now more villainous Mr Gaunt whom his family had tutted and flittered away any mentions of him when sorting through the postcodes of Little Hangleton had nefarious intentions with his children, he could easily lie and say that no one knew about them or who they were, in order to raise them in complete isolation and prevent them seeking help from relatives who might perhaps understand the significance of their problems and help someone of that particular ancestry. It would certain do a lot for Merope, whom Tom was beginning to gather must have been in the lowest of lows in her position when she had drugged him and...taken on that peculiar series of events. Really...it was curioser and curioser with even more much needed conversation.

"I mean. My grandfather had some issues with other families other the land he conquered from them, and my father was called to help rewrite the documents and blur the history," said Tom, sensing that Merope was beginning to become uneasy with revealing so much. He had never said this much to anyone about his family's own business in his life, including Ceceila who mostly found the horses, food, garden parties, and wealth pretty, but cared little with the true tensions behind it, and yet he could perhaps say more to Merope about this than anyone else in his life. "I know about it. And my family suspects the other families around Little Hangleton know I'm aware of that knowledge. But I must pretend I don't, also that I pretend I don't know they know I'm secretly do know but am actually pretending I'm not. It's a real mess, these things..."

"Well, when we've seen our relatives. Mostly my aunt from his side and a great-cousin twice removed or something. And they mostly tried to pretend we didn't exist, to not understand our lineage and kick us out of the house as soon as possible," admitted Merope, remembering that it had mostly been just a couple of visits with his father asking for money and them being removed as soon as possible.

"You can never be sure of these things," said Tom, adding some wisdom his own family had taught him. He grew up having to be aware of societal tensions with housing or other families realising what his did in the past to attain wealth, "really. You are a mystery waiting to be figured out Merope. And I...I want to help you with it."

"Why? What's in it for you?" asked Merope. She had felt good momentarily when Tom asked her these questions, it was a delight to talk to him, and really him, a real person, asking questions and everything, instead of a cardboard cutout who simply agreed with her every word and simpered with compliments and comfort from when he was drugged, but she had felt he was more interested in the affairs than her. Afterall, if it wasn't out of any real love, forming now or there, for her, why was he so interested?

"Because you are an enigma waiting to be solved, and I am a bored man with nothing to do. My grandfather was the one who was involved in three small wars, four document write-overs and many episodes of trickery and tomfoolery to keep the land. My father was the one who completed the forged documents and kept the secret. But I...I have nothing to do. And for my whole life, I've been bought up with these values of maintaining my family's wealth, and dealing with these societal tensions, but nothing real to really work on. You are an interesting puzzle waiting to be solved, and this is exactly the sort of thing I've been waiting for. I...you picked your choice well with who to drug," he said, a wry smile coming to his mouth, "I can offer you and your family a place to stay at my residence, shelter and protection, in exchange for your cooperation in uncovering the full mystery of what lies in the shack at the edge of Little Hangleton," he said, "afterall. You live in the postcode of land my family has municipal command over. And for the longest time ever since I was a small boy, I always wondered whether there was more to the mystery of the little shack at the edge of Little Hangleton every time my family went over the postcode. I could just never put my finger on it..." he said.

Merope paused, frowning. She had relished being able to reveal certain things about her past for the first time in her life, and to explain some of the reasons behind why she chose this particular action with him, which felt like a relief as it was a story and adventure she had started herself. But about sixteen years of experience and wisdom from her own life wasn't leaving her. And suddenly...she wished she had a memory potion to give him. She was uncertain if she really wanted to reveal any more details of the magical world to a muggle. She could make up some other lie, or simply tell him it was all over and for him to stay away otherwise he was being intrusive. Go back to her small shack at the edge of the woods, and live with her family until she could scrap up enough money to make it out on her own somehow. She could simply go back to normal and pretend this little escapade never happened. A mistake out of the few short decisions she ever made for herself in her life, ready to be glossed over and not touched again as she continued with her life's journey.

"I'm sure my offer would also help with the societal judgement, afterall, every non witch or wizard already knows. And I'm sure your family does too," he said, causing Merope's head to jerk up.

"What? How could they? I picked a good time...no one knows what happened..." she said, a mixture of embarrassment and fear coming over.

"Ah, but Ceceila was with me when we rode by. And all it takes is one person to go to your house to realise you're not there either," he said, "you know how I know? There's a little fence post we passed back then, that if a message had to be left out for travellers to see, would have been nailed to the post. I saw no notices, saw no signs of anyone coming to look for us or communicate with us whilst we were gone," he said, "that means no one was looking for us. Which means they didn't think my disappearance was a mystery and they guessed I ran of with you. My guesses are all the non witches and wizards know, your family too, and the past few months were just them waiting with baited breath about what was to become of us..."

Merope paused, cold blood racing through her veins. What he said had sense and logic to it, and she also had the fleeting suspicion it had all been too easy, and it was a wonder how she wasn't caught or traced by someone the entire few months they had left the place.

She briefly flashed it over in her mind. She wasn't sure how witch or wizard friendly this village was, but she didn't want to find out. And she could only imagine the assaults, verbal arrows, and who knows what else, any member of the village wanted to throw at her if she were to return. Especially as now that she was able to think of it a little, Tom was most likely many girl's heartthrob riding by...on a horse he didn't even like, as well as hers. And if her family knew...images of her father, filthy, enraged, spit flying from his mouth and a maniac grin in his eyes as he would run over the new events in his head, of Morfin, oh...what would Morfin do, and the first night back at the cold shack all alone with them...

Perhaps the filmsy idea she had of telling her family that she simply couldn't take it anymore and left to the woods to live by herself for several months that had been developing in the back of her head for the past morning or so wasn't going to work as well as she thought it could.

She glanced up, "on one condition," she said.

Tom's ears pricked up, "What?" he asked.

"You let me know everything about your family as well," she said, "afterall. We've been living in your hand for some time, and I want to know what secrets the most renowned but enigmatic muggle family we've chosen to take up residence on their land are hiding too," she said, a smile on her lips.

"It's a done deal," said Tom a moment later. The two shook hands. Alabaster neighed at the awkward position on his back.

Tom sighed, "I am retiring this horse the moment we get back. Always so prideful this one."

"You mean the others are friendlier?" said Merope, relief flooding her senses.

"He's a thoroughbred whose looks are bred for show," said Tom, referring to the white coat, and grey freckles across it's face, "and has been pampered excessively by stablehands his whole life. Try finding one that isn't arrogant."

"Mm," sighed Merope, happy that out of the two sentient beings she was with, at least one liked her more than the other. Or at least, if Tom disliked her but wasn't showing it, he disliked her several notches less than the horse.

They lapsed into a silence as they continued towards a particularly dark path of pathway shaded by thick trees, Merope and Tom somewhere in their own thoughts as the horses ears flattened against his head and his oval eyes narrowed to match his teeth in a low snarl.

* * *

**Author's Note: Thanks so much for reading and sticking with this story, it really means a lot to me after the long time no update. I know I put an author's note at the top but I felt there was a need for one at the bottom as well. I just wanted to say, some of the main themes and plot ideas that I had before are still going to happen, but some stuff has changed and really, it's a lot of me writing at the top of my head so I don't know which direction this story is going to be in, but I sure hope it's interesting. Also, am I the only one that thinks Tom doesn't like horses from the books? I mean, Voldemort's old, but he's not that old, he was born in 1926, and google says trains were invented in 1804, cars by the late 1800s, and that in the 1900s horses were only used for farms or war efforts at the most, and were a rarity even then. ****So am I the only one that thinks it's quite late for Tom's family to still be using horses then? **

**Also, is anyone surprised by the similarities between Tom Riddle Sr, and what a stereotypical Slytherin is like? I remember JK saying the Riddles owned a lot of land, so it seems they're not just rich and esteemed, but also owned a lot of estate which would give them some form of formal power or control over the village, and in those times land was obtained through these sort of things, so Merope maybe chose someone more Slytherin-like and closer to home than she first thought. And they both share some of the same tensions with growing up in prominent families. I didn't even realise how similar they were in a way until I wrote it...**

**Anyways, please review. It's been a long time and it would mean a lot to me to still see responses or interest in this story. If you're still sticking with this story and reading this chapter in any way, shape or form, please review to let me know your thoughts and that you're still here, even if it's just an update soon, it would mean a lot to me to still see reader responses after such a long time. **

**That's all, thank you and hope you all have a great day~~ **

**-Whymsicalbell**


	5. Ambushed

Spellbroken

Chapter 5 - Ambushed

* * *

"Should the horse be making that noise?" asked Merope. Famous last words before she was ejected out with a whinny and a neigh as the horse buckled and she felt herself fly through the air, a bloodcurling scream rising high as she caught on a tree-branch, and then tumbled down near the bottom. At least she still had her wand in her pocket.

"No," said Tom a minute late, but he was preoccupied with the five, dressed in black from head to toe figures in front of him. They were all rather uniform in height with two very big ones, who were taller and more broader than Tom would have liked. He was out in the wild with a panicked horse and no hunting rife or anything of that sort.

"Get him quick," said one of the taller ones, and that was the last clear moment Tom had before people came flying at him, and he frantically tried to keep them at bay.

He was outnumbered one to five, they were seasoned fighters and had probably done this numerous times. He was almost going to lose if it weren't for this horse. A horse was definitely worth something in fights. Even if they ended up badly injured afterward.

He tried to ignore the piercing screams around him and focus, as he gripped the reins tighter and used a handful of good pulls the stablehands had taught him that swiftly controlled a horse pretty well.

Alabaster was not a horse he had had much to do with. He hadn't had much to do with any of the horses at the stable, but had only recalled seeing Alabaster a handful of times, and hadn't known what this horse had been like. He vaguely knew the horse was arrogant and temperamental at times, but beyond that he had no idea how it responded in danger or it's mileage. Nonetheless, he knew it's front hooves were definitely powerful if kicked and he reared up the horse, causing it to kick two of the masked men heavily in the chest. They were taken by surprise, not expecting the horse to be involved and stumbled back heavily, landing on some jagged rocks near this shady outcrop of thick trees. A couple emitted quite winded groans.

A man on his left brandished a knife and another on his right pulled out a long silver dagger of some sort, the blade glinting in the sun. They were advancing on him from both sides. "You got any money?" They asked.

"All we want is your money."

He frantically fumbled through his wallet, and gave them the remainder of what he had, as well as the food provisions of apples, wild radishes and berries he had gathered. The men looked at it and let out a disgruntled screech - he hadn't had much on him at the time, and the next second he felt hands clasping around his head and shoulders. The world a blur as they tried to take him down.

It was angry clutches. Wild, angry, uncoordinated. They were mostly angry he didn't have much to steal, but they weren't purposeful in getting him of horseback or anything, and their grip was feeble as he was still quite a way higher than them. He gripped the reins and pulled Alabaster backward abruptly, causing the horse to almost completely jerk around, a small resistance along the left side told him it had been scratched by a knife or something along the way. He prayed the horse wasn't a bolter. And the next second the world went flying in a flash of colours as the stallion reared up and sharply kicked both men in the abdomen, seemingly scared and frantic. They tottered over backward, their clothes had visible scratches, and one let loose his grip on the knife, Tom watched it fall up briefly in the air before snatching it, and slashing the only person who had not attacked him yet down the forearm. As he predicted, they wore no armour, just black, and his anguished cries and blood filled the air. Tom's heartbeat dropped. He had gotten away from being attacked too badly, but had given a moderate wound to what had just been a bunch of street criminals. This wasn't good.

"Hang on. Egg, is it me or does this look like the runaway Tom Riddle?" one of the men said.

The one who had been kicked by the horse tottered over, clutching at his stomach, "No way," he said, his voice coming out higher, "We found Tom Riddle. And where's the girl? Morona?" The two men who had fallen over had regained their footing, they pulled out knives as well. This was not good. They all had weapons and they were advancing on Tom.

Meanwhile...

Merope groaned. She had fallen to the ground. Her body screamed in protest from the impact and she felt new bruises pick up where her old ones from about a week ago were just healing. Perhaps a week ago she would have simply left it and hoped to die, perhaps a week ago she felt that fate would have announced it was her time, and to simply accept things as it was. But perhaps it was talking to somebody real, perhaps it was uncovering some of the mysteries that circled her life which she had never paid attention to before, perhaps it was wanting to figure out who she was, and who the Riddles were, a man and family whom she now felt more impossibly tangled with than before, that gave her resolve and a purpose to keep living, keep existing, that she pulled herself and scanned her injuries.

She was lucky to hit the branch on the way down, it had given her new scratches, mostly on her back and neck, but she received a softer landing and it was mostly bruises that had erupted. She was very fortunate to not have landed awkwardly and didn't have any broken bones or sprained ankles or anything. And already, as if on cue, her magic was causing some of the smaller bruises to fade away faster than before, healing right before her very eyes. Her shaky fingers scrambled for her pocket, filling the folds for the familiar slip of her wand. It wasn't there. She could feel her heart beating faster. Left pocket. Right pocket. Left pocket again. Nope. She looked all around her, adrenaline and blood pumping through her veins. Innocent and dull-coloured grass stared back at her.

A horse neighed in the distance, more cries. She followed her senses, thinking Tom was safer.

The shady outcrop opened up to reveal a larger patch with rocks on either side. She burst through some bushes to see Tom and the horse, blood dribbling from a wound on it's side, surrounded by five men, two of whom advancing with a knife and a rather nasty and determined glint in their eye.

"We will avenge you for what you did to our member," said one, before lunging at Tom, eyes bulged and fingers lunging for the softness of Tom's throat.

"No-" she found herself screaming, all the moments of the morning flooding back. The horse ride there, the brief snaps of real conversation she had with someone for seemingly the first time in forever, the mystery about herself and him that once revealed to her eyes she couldn't ignore. She had to stay alive and find out what was happening.

The next second the world erupted in a bright sheen of light, as an orange glow appeared from the centre of the man, spreading higher and higher, an indescribable white centre near the middle. He had stopped momentarily, his eyes bulged and his mouth gaping and closing as he took in the orb. And then, in a flash a short spikey yellow spark shot out from the centre and struck his right arm, engulfing the entire limb in an electrifying sizzle. He didn't even have time to scream as a loud crack fell, and the next second plants sprang up from the ground. Dark vines, growing and lengthening on the spot, creeping themselves up the men's legs and entrapping them there, winding their ivy-like tendrils around their middle, their chest. Thorns creeping at every moment and digging firmly into the softness of their flesh, drawing blood and scratches.

Merope found her mouth gaping and closing. It had been the first time she used accidental magic in a very long time, and probably one of the most prominent. She didn't know what to think. The next second the lightening finished, and the man finally found his voice and let out a heart-piercing scream, only to reveal a burnt patch through his melted of sleeve, which was bubbling and frothing on the ground beneath him. A beautiful crossed mark appeared on his right limb, spreading from wrist to shoulder. A criss-cross of jagged lines, loops, curves, spreading like a dangerous flower unfurling it's petals. It was too purposeful and intricate to have been done by an accidental scratch. The smell of burning flesh was rife in the air, and pain - deeply pain filled screams.

"So it is the girl-" one of the other members said.

"Merope. Merope Gaunt! I'll remember that name-"

"She's a...she's a witch! A witch!" They were screaming, frantic, but then they grabbed their items and left, the men slashing themselves out of their green barricades with a frantic scramble of the knife, running away and clutching at their wounds.

Tom stared after them, wordless.

He wasn't staring a moment later, when he fell to the ground. Alabaster drooping low and rolling him of, before neighing, screaming, and running hectically across the path, towards the village. Merope thought she caught a flesh of wild wild, frantic eyes and fearful looks as he ran, his hooves clopping across the ground and never leaving, thundering down the path, growing faster and faster with every frightened turn of the corner, until it was just a dot no more, and had disappeared.

Silence fell. On the bright side, they were alone, and it was just them.

On the down side, they had no horse, no food, no money, no provisions, and all they had was just each other, thankfully uninjured, and Tom with a newfound knife.

As if on cue, it started raining, the first storm after a blissful few months of summery weather and abundantly growing food and peace. The rain falling in drizzles, collecting in the dent among the blackened patch of ground where the lightening struck, getting in her hair, her eyes.

"Come. We should get some shelter before we are ill. The furthest I've ever gone is the travelling post, and that was on a several weeks trip with some friends, but there's a cave nearby where boys typically make a fire when it gets dark," he said, grabbing her hand and pulling her sharply right with him. Shadows drooped and before Merope had even known what happened, they found themselves in a small cave. It was dark but the storm bought with it more darkness as it thickened, she could see thick puddles and small leafy ponds forming outside. The cave slid into an almost pitch blackness, as they felt along the walls. Coming to rest at a small corner inland where the walls muffled the wounds a little bit. The remains of a fireplace hung on the ground, stones arranged in a circle, bits of dirt and some charred ashes. A handful of sticks.

Tom sat down, Merope followed, he rested his head in his hands for a good while, silent.

A while later a flame flickered to light, she gathered up some dry leaves around the cave and sprinkled them in. Though she had the feeling it would last for some time, magically aided or not.

"Thanks for saving me," he said, uncertain. His gaze forlorn. Merope realised that perhaps it had been one of the few moments in his life where he felt he was truly threatened.

She looked for words to say, "No. Thanks for saving me. Before I thought I was just a...tramp of some sort. A disgusting slob floating through life, not knowing what to do. You...you made me feel special. Mysterious. Like I had a mystery to solve, like I was a mystery, and...gave me some sort of purpose. Even if we never saw each other again, I might want to find out more about my family and what really happened instead of just wanting to run away like before..." she said, "there is much I don't even know."

"You are a mystery," he said, "You have a regal family. A darkened past and a twisted fall from fame which is hidden in the shadows. Secretive relatives, I know they are expressive with their anger, but they don't tell you very much do they..."

"Not really much of anything no," she said with a shiver. The thought of her father and brother having more intelligence inside their darkened eyes and not revealing all they had known scared her more than anything else that had happened so far. But yet...now that it was said, it could not be unsaid, and she found it hard to go to sleep at night turning that over and over in her mind. If she thought she struggled to sleep in her family home upon going back before, she was even more afraid now, and not for the same demons twisting in the darkness as before.

"Suppose the twisted fall from fame wasn't really an accident. Inbreeding seems such a silly thing isn't it? Like something out of a story, a simplistic fairytale? Something someone would make up to make a descent into insanity possible. Inbreeding hasn't happened for real since the 16th and 17th century or so," he continued, "people know i's not medically advisable now. Even the most desperate of non witches and wizards are more than willing to date out to extend their family line. No one has ever thought it was a good idea for centuries. Suppose someone tricked your family? An outsider? Talked a member into inbreeding into someone else under a disguise? A potion that makes one person look like another? A little orchestration and anything's possible. Swindle the next generation of their wealth. It could all be orchestrated and then hidden..." he said.

And for the first time, Merope sobbed. Why was it that revisiting one's own family dramas and plots brought more sorrow, fear and unhappiness than anything else so far? For the longest time, she always thought her father's fixation and intensity with the lineage and tracing back their recent family's notable exploits was a joke, nothing more than just another topic of her father's angry rants that she never saw eye to eye but had always had to endure. But there had always been an underlying heavyness beside it. Afterall, hadn't her father spent her entire childhood trying to recollect the members and events that had happened since, trying to pierce together what became of them before they were born? Hadn't he been fixated on the glory of their lineage and property, and yet, did she really think a grown man would harbour over an issue with such intense fervour over nothing?

Suppose they had actually been swindled, her father, ignorant with the bliss of dulled intelligence from being less removed from the generation the inbreeding occurred, grasping onto only hints or tips of it in his childhood, trying to put together the pieces of the puzzle that didn't fit right? Why was it that Merope never knew her grandparents or extended family in that generation well at all?

There was a foggy darkness encasing her late family.

"You're crying," Tom pointed out astutely, "It must've stuck a chord in you. Something about your family made you feel funny growing up all these years?" he asked.

"Well if that did happen than the last descendants of Slytherin had more enemies than I ever really knew," she said, "They would have had to have the vision over several generations."

"It could just be me. Too much paranoia. But there is something that just doesn't quite fit right..." said Tom, turning the knife over and over in his hands before settling it down with a sigh and staring into the flames. A couple moments of silence fell.

"You were right," said Merope, "when you said they knew we were together. I didn't detect a hint of surprise when they saw me with you," she murmured, thinking of all the subtlies she had to navigate in their family home at the edge of the woods. Really, her entire upbringing had almost been training for soupy familial situations and tensions like these that she found herself in.

"You're better at observing and noticing these little details than many others," said Tom, "especially given the environment you must've grown up in. I came by a few times when you weren't around, and your folk," he paused, "were almost enough to give mine a run for their money," and so he broke of with a wry chuckle that Merope didn't want to ask more about, "that I think your observations should be taken for what they were. No, I don't suppose they were surprised to see us together. And now that they know..."

"It's confirmed for the whole village," said Merope, "they will go back and tell-"

"Bandits and petty criminals rarely provide the village much trouble," ruminated Tom, running his fingers through his hair, "they rarely actually hurt anyone or steal enough to really drive anyone into poverty. They're weapons are more for intimidation and if anything, they act like a better home security system in a roundabout way. Encourage people to not go out too late, lock their doors, and have some level of vigilance. When we hear reports of bandits over the years, we are rarely ever really concerned. And they are not the biggest criminals or real threats to village order. They do not really fear the law and so will not hesitate to confirm what they know. The whole village will have known we are together and making our way back, and..."

"They know I'm a witch," said Merope, "they saw."

"Did anyone besides your family know you were witches and wizards?" asking Tom, remembering that he had not particularly known what the poorer villagers who lived closer to Marvolo Gaunt's postcode really thought of the family or communicated with them. It was fascinating how much the top families turned a blind eye to the lower down and weirder families, and how much general information they did not bother to find out.

"No," said Merope, "I think they think I'm a gypsy or a tramp pretending to be a witch for the longest time. Though after today, I'm not really sure. They can't ignore it didn't happen-"

"No," said Tom, sucking in a breath, "you left a scar that won't disappear for a very long time. At the bare minimum, they will know a phenomenon occurred that day. And..." he paused, gathering his thoughts, before saying, "I-I believe you. If it weren't for that maybe I would have had my doubts. But I firmly believe you are a witch," he said, "you couldn't have done it otherwise. Do witches and wizards want non witches and wizards to know?" he asked, thinking that if he were one, he could very well understand the lines of thought of keeping it quiet.

"No. There's an international statue of secrecy for that," said Merope, "we're not supposed to do magic in front of muggles - people that can't do magic - and you are fined or imprisoned if you break it. My father was eventually sent to prison shortly after I escaped," she said unhappily, twisting a piece of her dress around and around in her hands, one way than that.

"Tell me more about your family," she said, "When did you acquire the land and move to Little Hangleton?"

"About five generations ago. It was a small village just set up by a bunch of capable, but dull-witted explorers," said Tom, Merope sensed it was a part of family history firmly pressed into him that he knew well, "my family were originally poor and weren't very influential. I think swindled by another family-"

"As with the times," she murmured, thinking of the stories her father told, "England is just a series of power struggles-"

"Always, throughout all points of history," agreed Tom quietly, "so my great great grandfather was angry. He didn't want to live under someone's thumb. He uprooted the family to Little Hangleton, we gathered some wealth before so we pretended to be richer than we really were, swindled our way into high class societies. He was good at eavesdropping and stealthing," he explained, "got our names down for some prominent schools, prominent society balls. Overheard some things, took advantage of some family dramas, made ourselves look like the hero, framed someone. Before he'd known it he'd amassed a mean bit of land and some power and influence, so we had firm roots there. But the enemies began."

Merope nodded.

"My great grandfather was a very agile and efficient man. He was an assassin in a way. And that was when some other prominent families started becoming suspicious, rigging up votes to the mayor or town council spots, trying to oust us of. The enemies and suspicions were rising. It's not nice to think of a family member as a killer-" Tom explained.

"I think for all my life, my father never killed anybody," agreed Merope, trying to help.

"I'm glad to hear you didn't have to work through that problem," said Tom, "and he managed to quiet them. So my family had a firm grip on the town's power. Some people were suspicious, but afraid. And the fear kept them from going anything. My grandfather mostly just maintained, always, with one eye open and fingers crossed behind his back. He also faced some minor setbacks with people from the surrounding villages trying to gain control, and some lasting enemies who didn't dare do anything drastic but tried to keep the power. He fought in a few wars and was good with forging documents, blackmail too, kept people afraid of him. And I told you what my father did up and what I didn't do up til this point."

"Muggles have things to blackmail?" asked Merope, slightly surprised. All she knew of muggles were the almost two-dimensional cardboard cutouts her father had said, and they weren't particularly complimentary to any of their capabilities.

"Of course," said Tom, "Secrets. Air thick with them. Affairs. Illicit marriages. Hasty elopements. Illegitimate children. Sibling rivalry. Family feuds. Taking sides. Betrayal, lies, secrets. You name it, we have it. Every society is full of their own drama."

"I always thought you looked like you were masking something," said Merope, thinking of all the moments she saw Tom riding by. Or on foot the occasional times. Sure, there was Tom, handsome, muggle, perfect, Tom, who rode by on a white stallion and had clothes made out of the finest materials, hair perfectly groomed and the indispensable air of someone who was perfect in every single way. And perhaps her childish heart believed that image, and perhaps that was the reason why she chose him to run away, but yet...perhaps she had sensed his mask, the same way she wore hers, and perhaps she sensed a closer connection to him, if not subconsciously, and in a way, she had chosen someone who was all to similar to her family in much the same way. Merope stared into the flames, unable to really tell. She supposed the underlying feeling had been there.

The fire died down now, her magic couldn't make it last on no kindle and thin air for that long of a time, and the cave was snuffed out in the twilight gloom. Outside the rain poured down. It would storm for at least the next day and a half. They would have no problems with water, but perhaps food would be an issue, though she wasn't hungry.

"Maybe that's why I was subconsciously drawn to you," she said, trying to explain her decision to drug him in particular in her mind. There had been other visitors around her shack throughout the sixteen years of life, decently handsome, probably nice men, or at least, nicer then her family, why him...?

"Be careful," said Tom suddenly, feeling her gaze on him, "I suspected you thought I was a nice man, a prince almost, to bring you away from the shackles of your problems. An escapade, and that perhaps you might've thought there was a mask I wore that matched yours. But be careful of who I am. I am my own person, with a particular familial past, and life adventures yet to happen, while we work through these mysteries together. You don't want to know what goes across my mind at times, and sometimes I even scare myself with my thoughts," he paused, "so be careful. You chose a hard person to drug and deal with in the aftermath of the spellbroken," he warned.

"And what's the price if I'm not?" whispered Merope, staring into the gaze of his man who had seemingly changed her life so much with several conversations in just the course of two days. She was afraid of him. If before he had simply been the handsome charming muggle from a well-do family that perhaps she even had the slightest looking down of, for not harbouring the magic that ran across her veins, now in some ways, it had been completely flipped and she was filled with respect and fear for him. His lack of magic just became a small quirk that could be worked around in these mysteries and not a character defining feature like her family may have pressed, and suddenly she was afraid of him not as a muggle or a man, but as a person.

"A permanently broken heart for real this time," said the man, staring straight at her, his eyes almost vivid with all the words and memories that made him him jumping out at him.

And so Merope wept, but this time he didn't comment or console her, the problem being them, and brought her dress to her eyes to dampen her tears perhaps a little. It seemed running away from her problems only bought her closer to what she had ran away from, and her chosen hero was just like her oppressors in some sick cycle, whether she was intentionally or unintentionally drawn to that, and like the same complexities followed her in her life. But then...what had he made her feel? That she was a mystery worth unravelling and perhaps this next segment of her life would also be a gripping mystery worth reliving and telling, truly, reliving a worthwhile part of her life, and not simply, the times of a runaway tramp with an insignificant man to live a simple life.

She was broken out of her thoughts by a familiar slithering sound across the stones.

"A snake," said Tom, knife in hand, "Food. The wild ones near the roads are harmless and edible."

"Stop," said Merope, "I...I can talk to snakes," she said, and somehow all the memories of playing with the snakes, who were generally gentler to her than her brother and father, and having them bring her small items or help her forage for food or plants at her request came back. One thing about her was that for one reason or another, she still couldn't possibly bring herself to maim, let alone eat, a snake, after all her life.

She talked to the snake who after strict pleading and negotiation, managed to bring back two dead squirrels for them, being the middle of summer where food was in abundance the snakes had more than enough food too. Tom then jumped with a start as he remembered the saddle had fallen of the horse when it threw him of and bought it back. After it dried Merope was surprised to find that somehow, she was still shaky with the events of the day, to have enough fear or anticipation within her to cast accidental magic and cause the saddle to burn, where they roasted the voles and nibbled at them. It would do for lunch and dinner and was much better than whatever the snake would have done for a meal.

The silence was broken by Tom who suddenly said, "And what else can you do with magic?" a new glint to his eye.

* * *

**Author's Note: Hello! Hope you're all doing well, thanks for reading and please review! Also, I just wanted to say that I've noticed I'm using a sort of 'modern' way of talking and describing, in terms of the dialogue and events that have happened in this chapter. And I just wanted to say that it was intentional because although this story is set in the 1920s, I didn't want to write a regency-era fic, or particularly in an old fashioned style/dialogue for this (wasn't a story I started to write in that particular style) so even though it's set in those times, the mood of the story is more modern and that's just how it's going to be for the rest of the story. I still think it's interesting and I can't wait to write some of the stuff I have in mind, so I hope it doesn't put too many readers of, and please review! I'd love to hear your thoughts...**

**-Whymsicalbell**


	6. More Much Needed Conversation

Spellbroken

Chapter 6 - More Much Needed Conversation

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"We can cast spells," she said.

"Like those?" he asked. They had finished eating for now and lapsed into easy conversation.

"That's accidental magic. We're not supposed to have any control over it. It only comes out when our lives are in danger, we're scared, angry, or feel threatened in some way."

"The bandits were still weighing on you when you made the fire?" he asked.

"Well no," said Merope, frowning, "It was probably because I was scared of hunger."

"Seems like a minor inconvenience compared to the bandits," pointed out Tom.

"Mm," said Merope. Truthfully she had always been able to cast some form of wordless magic to help her with her tasks growing up, and she had always known that. Previously she had thought it was because she was fearful of her father punishing her, or fearful of tiring herself out after an already busy morning, but now that Tom pointed it out...minor inconvenience seemed had a certain ring to it in describing the situation she couldn't put down.

"Want to know what I think?" asked Tom.

"Now I'm really scared..." she murmured.

"I think you're better at magic than you think you are. And I think some of it, this "accidental magic", was purposeful, just for convenience rather than true threat. I think you are a talented witch, especially given the fact that you don't sound to have grown up in the most nurturing of all homes. Did you ever go to this school?" he asked.

"No," she said with a frown.

"Why not? You seem to have ancestry in founding it..." he said.

"My father didn't like the school. Said it still agreed with the other three founders words against our ancestor, and admitted students whose parents weren't witches or wizards," she explained.

"Is this magic genetic?" he asked, it sounded more and more like something that was from their brief conversations.

"No one's really sure," said Merope, "just that muggle-born witches or wizards as they are called, aren't particularly welcome in the society," she surprised herself with how much she picked up over the years at times, "or mudbloods. As the people who don't welcome them in the society call them."

"I imagine it's complicated. And you're caught on the edge," he said, a shred of pity in his eyes. Merope supposed her situation and story sounded more convoluted the more Tom encouraged her to talk about it. He certainly had a talent for making people talk. She could hardly believe she had revealed so much so easily.

"Can your family do the same accidental magic as you?" he asked.

Merope frowned, for all her life she had never really considered her family's magical abilities except for 'better than' hers. "Yes," she said, "My family could always make things do as they want without picking up a wand. Usually witches or wizards have to use those to channel magic through them. Every witch or wizard has wands, but I've seen both my father and brother make things move towards them, or things cook themselves or any number of things without reaching for their wand. I've never thought much about it."

"Your entire family seems very potent with magic," said Tom, "I don't think you are an ordinary witch. I think you have a particular past, particular talents, and of course, a particular future. This is bad, very bad."

"Why's that?" asked Merope, her heart beating. She wanted less adventure with Tom, not more. Perhaps there was something about his weary mask or demeanour that drew her into him, but she didn't want more magical maladies.

"It's uneven and unbalanced," he said, "Your family is very magical. You have a prominent name and past. But you've no known enemies. You have talented powers, and Little Hangleton has not seen any real bloodshed from any one of it's members, for a very long time. It's a bad omen. Too many good things and no real hardships. I know financial difficulties are an issue, but they could be easily resolved. Your family's twisted fall from power is darkened with a past. If you ask me, something is going to happen, and you are given all these spells and abilities by some other force of nature to prepare you for the times ahead. I believe we have some dark, dark times coming, and the only way out is through," he said simply, "as we speak. There is most likely war raging in the village with what's happening. There's been tensions in Little Hangleton for a very very long time, and I don't suppose either party are happy to hear of our runaway, or your magic on the bandits and the possible reveal of the truth. I only see dark times ahead, and you and I would get through them ourselves."

Merope began sobbing into her dress again. She couldn't believe she had felt so helpless, but yet she found herself crying from these new revelations. But within her, a steely resolve formed. She wanted to find out more about her family, she wanted to find out her full past, she wanted to learn more about the wizarding world and the muggle world, she wanted to find out her origins and die as a satisfied person.

She paused and looked up, taking into account the man who had done nothing but good to her since he first opened his eyes after the spell broke, and set about on her latest goal that just formed several moments ago - find out more about him. She was curious too. Now that he had revealed some of his history to her, it had sparked even more of a curiosity within her too.

"Did you want to be born into such a family? You must feel very pressured to keep a firm hand on the land and power structures lest you show weakness to forces outside your home?"

"I enjoy what we have. The house and garden parties are splendid. So are the balls. Our hunting games and murder mystery games are great fun, and I'm good at them, I do them quite well," he said with a wink, "but I'm not dependent on them, and I don't need such a thing in old age to be happy. I've always...been attracted action, adventure...my life felt blank and empty and like it was all built up for nothing until you walked into it actually," he said.

"What about Cecilia? Did you like her?" asked Merope.

Tom paused, a hand on his chin, "She's a splendid women. A fine specimen. Very attractive and has grown up well for a woman of her class. But I'm craving something more, and the mystery and action might be something that only comes from you," he said, a smile on his face as he looked at her.

"Enough to call of the engagement?" asked Merope. She couldn't decide whether she still liked Tom or not, or if she even did like him romantically in the first place. She supposed coming from a family of poverty and ill-dispute, her father's recent imprisonment which meant the reigns had temporarily slackened and the disorientation of her brother as well as an...attraction and drawnness, towards the late Mr Tom Riddle, she had come to think of it instead of a simple crush, had caused the events to happen. Now that she thought it was mostly a childish thing she did on a whim that she would have regretted if it weren't for Tom awakening the curiosity inside of her for her family tree and all the mysteries that surrounded her life, she wasn't sure if she ever liked him romantically or if she wanted to continue liking him that way now. These feelings and emotions briefly ran through her mind, she had settled for neither liking nor ruling him out romantically but simply going through these mysteries together. And try not to fall in love with him, a voice said. Still, it probably helped if he wasn't engaged to Cecilia and had that out of the way.

"It would be helpful to keep it up," he said, "we'll be doing a lot of investigating, perhaps absent from Little Hangleton a bit. Having that engagement would help make it easier. And I still do love Cecilia in my own way."

"Do you love me?" It was perhaps an ill-timed question, but Merope couldn't help it spilling out of her mouth. She didn't know what she was aiming for. Given the fact that he just woke up from a three-month drug coma and that their recent conversations had been anything but light, she wasn't even sure she wanted to hear his thoughts. But yet, she wanted to know whether his thoughts from neutrality had changed since the fated day he awoke, and whether he...was working towards any sort of romantic relationship with her in the future.

"I find you a mystery. And that's interesting to me. But I can't say I love you," he said, and his face held no trace of a lie, "but you are not unpleasant company. And I believe I'm fond of you in a way," he said softly.

"Would you ever love me?" asked Merope, unable to believe she was really asking these questions. But there was just something about their relationship and conversations that made deep seated topics rise to the surface in a way. It had been several days and she told half her life's story to him and they were already talking about deeper topics she never thought she would get to discuss with a man, including asking if anyone ever loved her.

"I'm not working towards it. But if it happens it happens, just be careful you don't fall in love with me and get your heart broken without me also falling in love with you," he said, a smirk on his lips. Merope bit her own lips, there it was, this handsome arrogant Tom Riddle that she had occasionally seen. Now that the pressing issues of the situation had worn of a little, and they had talked over some of the major details this joking, flirtacious side was coming out, and she wasn't entirely sure she liked it, though she couldn't put a finger on it.

"Did you ever love me?" Tom asked a moment later, he selected a stone from the fireplace and began sharpening his knife for something to do. Thankfully it had room to be sharpened so it wasn't a complete waste of time.

"I used to think I did, but now I'm not sure," Merope said, "it was a stupid idea anyway. I regret it now."

"I agree it was stupid," he said.

Merope smiled at him, "Just childish. I'm actually really sorry. I hope to forget about it-"

"You're forgiven," he said, "blank state from now on. I didn't think you really loved me during that stint either. You were in a peculiar situation with little real options and it was what happened," a smirk met his lips, "was I good in bed?" he asked.

Merope pressed her lips together, "you'd have to fuck me when you're not drugged so I can compare," she said, though she really just didn't want to admit she had no one else to compare it to.

"Friends with benefits. Is this what we're aiming for?" His tone was light, but Merope sensed an uncertainty. He really wasn't sure if she preferred to sleep around or anything and she wasn't sure what she wanted to do either. She hadn't really particularly wanted to fuck a man she had drugged up whilst on the run, but he had been so sweet and simpering back then, supporting her every comment and doing the general lovely-dovely things. They had been near a bed, she maybe said one or two things and cuddled up to him for warmth, some encouragement later and everything sprawled forth. It was amazing how easily Amortentia led to sex without it being particularly orchestrated. She wasn't even sure if she particularly liked it, or saw any benefit to herself to sleep around. The whole three months had suddenly seemed strange and like some childish adventure she wished to forget. Especially in light of the real conversations they had then. And he hadn't really made her feel anything particular then, she didn't think she ever really loved him, or at least, not during that childish escapade. He was right, their real destiny started now.

"I rather not," she said. A lapse in conversation arose.

"Would you ever love me?" he asked, reminiscent of the question she asked him.

Merope struggled for an answer, "I guess it depends if you're interesting enough." Talking to someone indefinitely more wittier than her and attempting to come up with semi-witty answers to match him was at times more of a struggle than she had bargained for, but a good one.

"I think my father's prison sentence would have ended by now," she said, "so he would be back by the time we get back. How long would that be?"

"Must've been a petty crime then. On foot, 2 weeks travelling hard everyday minimum," he said.

"Wizarding prison is pretty tough. They generally don't sentence you for a long time unless you did something really bad, like murdered someone in cold blood," she said, "but knowing him, yeah probably something petty. The longest?" she asked.

"A month but I was having a better idea," said Tom.

"What is it?" she asked.

"You have potent magic. I think you should practice it. Try to control your...wandless magic even more than you can now. It could come in handy later on. But I was hoping you'd be able to do something."

"And what's that?" asked Merope.

Tom grinned at her, "You'd know. You're the one with the magic," leaving Merope to her thoughts for a little while.

"I have an idea. But I'd need the rain to clear so I have full focus," she said, chewing on her lip slowly.

"Alright. What other animals can you talk to?" he asked.

"It's just snakes and I think it's just my family," said Merope, "at least, my father was very proud of that trait being passed down our lineage and said it was just a Slytherin thing."

"Slytherin?" asked Tom.

"Salazar Slytherin. The name of the ancestor that founded the school. The others were Godric Gryffindor, Helena Hufflepuff and Rowena Ravenclaw. They each had a house named after them. All students were sorted into them in their first year," she explained. It amazed her how much she was able to pick up from her father's bitter ramblings, and how much hatred or prejudice that had been steeped into them. She had to take care to try and remove her father's biases from her descriptions of the wizarding world to a new person - Tom.

"Sounds like something that had inner turmoil and tensions written in it's fate from the start. I'm betting each house had specific qualities they were meant to embody," Tom said, thinking how much it sounded like lacrosse or hockey, which could temporarily divide a village in the teams they supported, each side claiming there was some immutable quality to their chosen loyalties.

"There was. Gryffindor was the brave. Hufflepuff the one who took the rest. Ravenclaw the intelligent. Slytherin the one who thought for themselves. Muggles didn't do nice things to witches or wizards back then, and having magic, namely accidental magic, didn't make it easy to disguise from muggles without proper schooling of how to control and use these abilities. Slytherin said all you needed at Hogwarts was just to learn enough to live and manage your wizard or witch skills for the remainder of your life, wherever company you found yourself in. You didn't need to learn to be specifically brave, or spend too much time on thought conundrums, or be exceedingly altruistic," said Merope, thinking of the veiled message behind her father's ramblings about Slytherin. It was amazing how much perspective he was able to provide from Slytherin's side in all of this, that Merope didn't even realise she had until now.

"Slytherin sounds like it has the potential to be misunderstood. I'm betting the others didn't have as nice of a view of it as the insight that has been passed down through it's descendants," said Tom, his brain whirling at a hundred miles per hour with these new secrets and mysteries.

"No. There was tension among them even before the big fight over whether to admit muggle-borns or not happened," admitted Merope, "but I'm not too sure about that. My father didn't say too much as I was growing up. The answers of my family, or some of them, lie only in my father at the moment. I don't know them."

"How was he driven out? The nature of that might be revealing," asked Tom.

"He left actually, didn't want it to have to come down to a point where he was driven out. My father said he built a hidden chamber underneath the school before he left, but he didn't tell the others. There's a Basilisk there, it's a special snake that can kill you if you look at it in the eye. People who can talk to snakes can talk to the Basilisk, and that's something which only runs in the Slytherin family line. He said before he left, that the right heir would come along and control the snake to kill the school of muggle-borns," said Merope, thinking about how pointedly that story had been passed down over the generations and by her father in his rage-filled rants throughout the years. It amazed her just how much of Slytherin's inner perspective her family really knew. And for the first time, Merope made a new relevation that wasn't negative about her previous family life, and it was the realisation that her father, a previously cantankerous, quick-tempered and violent tendencies sort of person in her mind, had actually done a rather good job of passing down valuable knowledge about her family's past throughout the years. And for the first time, she maybe saw a point to talk to him especially, to find out the secrets of her family line. And Morfin - what about him, would he want a part in this, and truly, tracking down the secrets that seemed to haunt them forever? Alongside Tom? Whilst her father seemed to have an obligatory sort of hatred of muggle-borns, Morfin seemed to hate them with a personal sort of vilified grace, and Merope wasn't sure how he would take to Tom, or his new role in all this.

"His timely departure might not be all in his choice," said Tom, "he could have foreseen threats that he didn't want to answer to, and thought it was best to leave before they got him, and the chamber and particular spat over muggle borns was just his decoration to leave in style. There could still be existing tensions between them that were unrelated to the chamber at all which ultimately drove his leave, and the chamber was just a bandaid over the true cracks that had appeared between the founders," he finished, "did your father ever recall from his relatives a clear leader?"

"Yes, Godric," said Merope, "even though Rowena and Helena were intelligent and hardworking respectively, they were still women. And women have always been a bit physically weaker than men. I think in order to build a school, lots of construction and probably clearing the land of dangerous creatures and beasts that lived there, Godric and Salazar would've had the advantage in leading, as it was ultimately a physical feat, and it would have come down to one of them to be unanimously voted the leader in pushing forward. Godric was charismatic as well as brave and skilled, he would have tried to be a leader," she said. It amazed her how much she knew, was able to make sense of these things, particularly tensions of a hidden nature she didn't think she would. Having previously spent most of her life cowering under being scolded at for household chores and thinking she was the worst witch and person to ever exist, she was surprised she was able to make something of it, but she supposed even the lowest person had their thoughts, and it was strange but exhilarating to bring them out.

"So it was just between the two of them. A hidden didactic of power between them, and possibly struggling to make appearances of looking good and 'right' on top, in order to subtly sway the other witches, who held a lower amount of power in the feat of building a school, to them. And ultimately, one had to be driven out," finished Tom, beginning to see the story through his lens of a weathered hand with power struggles and inner family tensions.

"Yes..." said Merope, a little darkly and somberly. Perhaps she had been able to understand why her father often had erratic and heinous moods now, regarding their history. She could imagine him piercing it all together, the only piece of sanity in his otherwise confusing life, being less removed from the generation in which the inbreeding had happened than her, struggling to put it in words, but having the realisation not was all right, clear as water, written in his thoughts somewhere. And perhaps the zealous rage to do them right, bring Slytherin's plight into the light, unveil the darkness that perhaps Gryffindor's descendants and followers cast him in, bring truth to the depths of Godric's real character, or at least...remain sure it was passed down, generation to generation, even at the expense of all else. Money, jobs, poverty, as long as the truth remained in some shape or form...

"There's so much that remains uncovered without some proper exploration. Would I be able to see the school or some of these magical things, being a non-wizard, or would I need 'the sight'?" asked Tom.

"Anyone can see them. And in the past muggles have raised odd questions when they saw wizarding dwellings or creatures. But there's been an official enchantment put on some magical things, such as the school, Hogwarts by the way, that deters non-magical people from being able to see them. I wouldn't count on being able to see them..."

"I'd have to rely on my wits then," he said.

A sort of comfortable silence fell. "Tell me about your family. Your mother, father, anyone alive...is there anything I would need to know before I meet them?" she said, "I'm probably going to meet them at least once when we return..."

* * *

**Author's Note: Thanks for continuing to read and please review! I'd still love to hear thoughts! Also, is anyone surprised by just how much plot there could be with a Merope-centric fic? I didn't notice this before writing it, but there's so much backstory, significant histories, possibility for tensions etc, that I never noticed about this character until I truly started writing a Merope-centric fic. I'm pleasantly surprised and can't wait to write more...**

**-Whymsicalbell **


	7. The Very Quick Trip

Spellbroken

Chapter 7 - The Very Quick Trip

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"My grandfather is alive and well. But he doesn't live here. He lives in Great Hangleton with my grandmother's sister, my grand-aunt. She had never had any children so they're my only relatives in that generation from my father's side. He has an affinity for the stock market despite his age and has a finger in that pie in his retirement. He always spoils us when he comes over or when we go to his place," said Tom.

"Great Hangleton?" asked Merope.

"A larger village about six miles from Little Hangleton. The only one within reach really. My family travelled from another village further away. The original settlement who founded Little Hangleton most likely came from Great Hangleton," he explained.

"I can't remember where my father lived before coming here, but I only started living here for this generation and it definitely wasn't Great Hangleton," ruminated Merope, "why did your grandfather leave? Your family had wealth, name and a presumably comfortable life here."

"He couldn't stand it after my grandmother died," said Tom, "caught a liver disease from some of the more shady company my grandfather dealt with when they came over one day to collect some documents. It was his last forgery. She had always been ill of health, and he had always said if you have too many victories in life, life takes something away from you. It's a hidden grief he admitted to me only once," said Tom, ebbing of into silence, "not many people outside the family know."

"I'll keep it a secret," Merope said, immediately sensing this was supposed to be a kept within.

"Tell any ears that aren't supposed to know or aren't directly trading information for these mysteries, any of my family's inner secrets and I will spill yours to ears you don't even want to know of," said Tom.

"It's a done deal," murmured Merope, wondering if this was blackmail. To think of the Riddle family's skills and powers in their ascent to power being turned against hers was not a very comforting thought, but a fine line she had to walk if she wanted to uncover these mysteries with Tom by her side, who she now realised was perhaps a great asset to her family mysteries if used right, possibly equal to the greatest private detective. Vaguely she wondered if some of the gold which her father had said was lost two generations before hers, had been through some hopeful attempts at a private detective in uncovering matters.

"What are your grandparents from your mother's side like?" she asked a little while later, changing the subject.

"Always pleasant but not too knowledgeable about politics and prefer to just enjoy a quiet life - fishing, baking, stitching, that sort of stuff. They live about half an hour's drive from my home," said Tom, "they don't like low-class people so you have to be careful."

Merope nodded, "and your mother?" she asked, almost wiping a tear from her eye. It had been a while since her mother had died so she had not much to do with mothers for a long time, and hearing about some, even from someone else, would be a somber conversation in any way.

"Mary Riddle. She never had much of a hand in politics either and preferred the finer things in life. She went to an expensive prep school, was told she always looked enchanting given her looks, so wanted to star in small silent films at some point in her life. I don't think she ever did, but it's what she talks about when her friends come over," said Tom.

"My father Thomas Riddle is a quiet man, who sometimes gambles, but he's experienced and skilled with those arts. He's somewhat of a mathematician. He can be explosive with anger over matters at times," he continued, "Then there's my aunt and uncle Mildred and Wilbur, cousins Todd and Lorriander, we meet every christmas, new year's, winter or summer balls, hunting parties, masquerades, quite a lot of events we share. There's also the Robins, Barnes and Jenkins families, we are quite close and meet at these events too."

"Are they the families that you struggle for wealth over?" she asked, thinking of Tom's story of the original families in Little Hangleton.

"The Robins and Jenkins are, but there's one more party to the mix - the Weiwells, who live in a mansion near the outskirts of the village. Between the four of us, we own the majority of the estate in Little Hangleton, and they are the only families to ever express a real interest in sharing the estates and local town council seats," he finished.

"Which one's concerning you?" asked Merope, thinking of what Tom said with the tensions.

"We fought with the Robins and Weiwells before, my grandfather blackmailed the Robins once and the Jenkins twice," he said, a frown to his brow, "like you. The exact details are a little foggy. My father only told me the details in passing conversations about how our family acquired our wealth, nothing close to a proper dissertation. I...I hear one of those families are hoping to marry into the Riddles actually, possess a portion of the wealth through me..." Tom finished, looking more and more uneasy, "Of course, I know about these intentions with me, and am cautious. But..."

"You don't know if somebody is playing the fool or not. Fooling you into believing they are easier to see through than they really are...you have to be doubley-cautious...," said Merope, thinking of how sometimes when she thought her father's anger tantrums were over they weren't, "it must be hard to live comfortably, with that on your mind..."

Tom bit his lip, a shadow passing over his otherwise unperturbed features.

"What do you think would happen when we get back? I...I think it's better I stay with my family, calm them down first, I...there is probably work to do in the shack," said Merope, thinking that even the combined cooking or cleaning her father and Morfin could do was probably not much.

"I shall go back, renew the engagement if Cecilia shall still want me, I should think she does but it would depend on her mood, and how she would feel at that split moment. I think it's best I have a talk with my family about what's really being said in the newspapers and among the town gossipers and work to stifle those rumours for now. We better hold of bringing the fact that you are a witch with magical powers into the story until we are sure that it is the right time to reveal them. I could pass it of as the bandits having a fit as they are mad," said Tom, "it's my word against several street criminals. It will hold as the believed story for quite some time."

"And you running of with me. How should we explain that?" asked Merope.

"A drug-induced dilemma that I eventually woke up to and brought you back to your hometown once I had come to my senses, being the gentlemen that I am," he said with a smile.

"But the magical potion, how will you explain that?" asked Merope.

"Did I say a magically drug-induced dilemma? Or merely just a drug-induced dilemma?" he quipped, another smile to his face.

"I see," said Merope, "somehow I doubt my family will come to correct them as well. It...works surprisingly well. And the baby...do we tell them about that..."

"No," Tom's face darkened, "that's an ominous event we keep to ourselves and do not reveal unless it is absolutely necessary, at the right moment," he said.

"So many secrets..." said Merope, "but I'm used to them. I've kept secrets with my family," a bitter laugh rang out, as she remembered some of the smaller details and tensions in the daily life with the Gaunts, that she had omitted, "and now I'm keeping secrets in my next stage of life with you," she finished.

"Don't despair, you remind me a little of cinderella or rapunzel or something or rather," said Tom, "you've lived the first half of your life with some idea that something was wrong, or of your family's particular past or heritage. But very little real insight. And just like the others, you will come to awaken and discover your true destiny at the right moment, and it will be interesting and glorious, and every bit as eventful and up, as it will be down. Remember these moments of where your life really began," he said all of a sudden, coming to hold Merope's hands and swaying her ever so slightly from side to side like a waltz, "Merope," he repeated, "it even sounds like a name that could belong to a princess," he murmured quietly to herself.

And Merope sobbed at the illusions of a safer past that was now broken, and the twisted fates that could potentially await them in the future, as well as what he had just said. For once she guessed what fairytales were, she also guessed they also didn't always have happy endings.

The next morning it was still raining, but the shaded outcrop of trees provided much shelter from the rain so it wasn't terrible to go look for edible plants near the cave. Tom told her to stay in the cave, or near it, as he knew the place better, and left to attempt to find anything edible along the stretch of darkened outcrop at this patch of the path.

He never particularly liked camping, having grown up in affluence and seen it as a bit of a common man's hobby, but enough boy scout activities, hunting parties, or the big camp out with some of his classmates at the end of the last year of his schooling had given him enough experiences to go of. It was only thanks to those that this adventure wasn't entirely new to him, and could have been worse than what had currently happened. Alabaster had probably ran off back to the stables, he thought, that spoiled horse had always liked the stables at the Riddle house and even if cast in disgrace for being the carrier of a runaway betrothed fiancee and what the village would consider a tramp, he would most likely be welcomed back with affectionate arms by the stablehands who took care of him, and become embedded in Riddle life again.

Of course, he would have to make a request not to take that particular horse out if he wanted a ride - he didn't fancy another bumpy one. He doubted the arrogant stallion would forget about the happenings for a very long time, and there were more than enough horses otherwise to do the job of transporting him around. Really, why his father had never invested in cars was beyond him, even his grandfather had owned one or two of the latest models, and Tom wouldn't have minded having his own car to drive around if his family chose to purchase them.

He had enough wealth to foot his own should his father make the decision to finally say goodbye to the horses and the stables, and invest in the much trendier (and far less effort) cars, he thought. Tom hadn't really known what to do once he completed his schooling, he quite liked a lot of his studies - history, geography, economics, business, real estate, and had enough of a way with real estate to want to invest in some properties and create a bit of a business there, while he figured out what the next big steps of his life were like. His plans with real estate had also been to get Cecilia to accept his proposal to some extent.

Although it was quite obvious to everyone that the young, darling, Cecilia would love to fall in love with a well renowned, high class, figure like himself, and only natural they would hope he had a little bit of endearment for her (and that he did, though for perhaps some other reason than those that fell easily to the eyes of the townspeople) to do justice to the coupling, there was still a note of expectation there. And the view that he was rather young, an unproven man, and even such a renowned figure like himself needed to have some proof of some shape or form, before it was readily accepted Cecilia could possibly become betrothed to him. It was also more convenient. He had liked Cecilia and thought there was something about her that would make a more than acceptable wife, and perhaps it was a rarity to find someone he clicked with as much as he did her, with no real conflicts or drama, that he didn't want to bother with the trouble of finding another like her later on should he pass up the opportunity, so he proposed, attempting to engage now and marry later, when they were ready. It had been more of a gesture of showing she was taken rather than any real interest in playing the husband and wife at the moment.

They were to get married, and move out into their own home. He would invest in real estate for the meantime until he found his real interest. They would probably throw parties and simply get to know each other more, not even thinking about such heavy things like children or anything until many, many years later. He was nineteen, having graduated last year, and Ceceila was an almost perfect six months his junior. They had grown up in the same year throughout their schooling and had brief, but sweet interactions all throughout.

He had finished picking the dandelions, blackberries, sorrel and chickweed he found growing nearby. Since this was quite a far location from the village with few travelers the sides of the path were just teaming with those.

He met Merope outside the cave and they had a quiet breakfast outside. The rain had borne down to a low drizzle that was hardly felt from their canopy by low morning.

"You know how you told me I should work on my magic?" asked Merope.

"Mm, I'm waiting to be surprised," said Tom with a smile.

"Well...there was something I did once by accident, or maybe on purpose, I'm not really able to tell at the moment. I think my father was about to shout at me for something, one moment I was in the kitchen, wishing I was somewhere further away, like the laundry room. And the next moment I saw the laundry room around me, like I was actually there," she frowned, "I wasn't sure if it was my imagination or not, but I practiced many times while you were gone to try and get it down perfectly. Here, hold my arm."

And so Tom slipped his arms into her, bemused. He had formed the opinion that witches and wizards abilities ranged from mild to extremely powerful, and that although Merope could be incredibly powerful, the sort of magic the situation called for wasn't too harmful, and he was not really scared. He had the sense he could probably deal with witches or wizards around him doing mild magic and not really be bothered besides acknowledging it was just something they had which he hadn't, and it would take more to really get a fright out of him, and he would feel it if the situation turned so bad.

The next few seconds felt like a strong tugging at the navel for both of them, the world flashed in a blur and soon the cave and rocky outcrop was no more, the greenery blurring away to land in a clearing with more green plants, and shrubs, a handful of small butterflies which scattered in alarm and the familiar well-trodden path towards the village. Even Tom recognised this, though in the next second he had clasped onto a tree, leaning against the branches and trying not to dry heave, with some sweat forming around his pale face.

"I'm sorry. I felt sick the first few times I practiced about five yards or so back near the shady outcrop," said Merope, "I think it's worse over longer distances, and the less used to it you are."

She managed to remain composed whilst Tom still tried not to throw up. They were just about a five minute walk from the edge of the woods and where Merope's shack was, along with the winding pavement towards the village. It was very close to home and actually miraculously cut their journey by a lot.

Tom was still rather pale-faced and shaky as he regained his footing a little, and they began to make way towards the village.

"We're on a sign..." whispered Merope softly once they got out of the clearing and was on the path towards home, the large wooden board very close to the edge of the woods for travelers had some 'wanted' posters up with a photograph of Tom and a police sketch of Merope, done with startling accuracy which suggested her father or brother must've complied with authorities somewhat. That was worrying in a way.

Before he could reply there was a rustle of bushes and three figures in trench coats with rifles rode up on horseback, with the barrel of the gun pointed directly at them.

"Look who turned up," the middle said with a sneer.

"Hands up in the air now. And drop that knife. Or I'll shoot," said the right with a laugh, cocking his gun at them.

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**Author's Note: Hello, thanks for reading and please review! Interesting fact - Great Hangleton is actually in canon, it's in the wikia! :P And Mary and Thomas are Tom's parents real names, but all the other details about their family are made up. And Hogwarts was also built in 990 A.D. (read up on it as research lol) so Merope's family has had many generations for the opportunity of inbreeding to occur, whether it was an honest mistake or deliberately orchestrated somehow :P **

**-Whymsicalbell **


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